Bellatrix Aerospace

Bellatrix Aerospace builds engines that move satellites around once they are in orbit. Arka is a Hall-effect thruster, which uses electric power to push out xenon. Rudra is a chemical thruster that runs on a green propellant instead of toxic hydrazine. Both were qualified in space in January 2024. They flew as experiments on POEM-3, an ISRO test platform made from a rocket's used upper stage. Rudra fired again on a second flight a year later. The range also includes thrusters for nanosatellites and Pushpak, a space tug for placing satellites in their final orbits.

Rohan M Ganapathy and Yashas Karanam started Bellatrix in 2015, and it was incubated at the Indian Institute of Science in Bengaluru. ISRO gave it a development order for a satellite propulsion system in 2016. The company opened a US subsidiary in April 2025 and raised $20 million in March 2026 to expand production. That same month Harbinger, its first complete satellite, flew on SpaceX's Transporter-16 to test Bellatrix's own subsystems in orbit, including attitude control.

Harbinger is a step toward very low orbits. Project 200, unveiled in 2024, is a satellite designed to fly between 180 and 250 km, far below most satellites, where air drag is strong and a satellite needs its thrusters to stay up. In May 2026 Korea's TelePIX signed a memorandum with Bellatrix to plan a demonstration satellite at that altitude for 2028. NSIL, ISRO's commercial arm, signed a memorandum in 2024 to fly Pushpak on its launches.